A Case Study of People who started successful Newsletter working a 9-5 Job

The value we create is in direct proportion to how we are rewarded financially. Most people who work 9-5 are getting paid based on the value they offer to their Employers and most times the reward-to-value ratio isn’t at the level that is desired. Therefore, to potentially increase that reward proportion for an employee is to become valuable beyond a single entity i.e The Employer. In this article, I breakdown how people were able to build a successful newsletter working a 9-5 job, how they started, what topics they focused on if they left their 9-5 job.

Introduction

It doesn’t matter what industry or field you work, everyone has a different perspective on a topic or experience. There isn’t a world that exist where two people see things, go through the same exact exact path or live the same life, there may be similarities but not precisely the same. This uniqueness is a key to building a personal brand, it means you have a story to tell that someone out there has not gone through as you have done.

Breakdown

Here are real stories of people who started a Newsletter and what we can learn from their Journey:

CJ Gustafson – Mostly Metrics

CJ works as a Chief Financial Officer for a Tech Company and started out writing about his day-to-day experience in the the Finance world. He founded the Mostly Metrics in February 2022, where he shares his insights on topics such as “Metrics on SaaS Startups”, “Financial Forecasting”, “Fundraising”.

Although this newsletter being the very current one he is focused on, he actually started a previous one known as “Steal my Idea” where he talks about businesses he would potentially start and generate income. The format he used in this newsletter was infographics with breakdown of the topics, having mainly images in emails sometimes might not be the best format as email providers have different settings or behaviours which may make the image look distorted. He made adjustments and decided to focus on text which was the birth of the current newsletter.

He pivoted into “mostly metrics” due to his subscribers liking his opinions and insights on industry topics, this made him decide to focus on that topic and it eventually became a success.

One thing i found very interesting with this, is you don’t have to be perfect in your first project, it provides a good lesson for your upcoming projects.

How was he able to do that during his 9-5?

He was able to work on the content mornings before work and for a longer period on Sundays, things he didn’t really understand during his workday became a topic for the Newsletter. At the start consistency was key to him not trying to have the perfect content.

What opportunities did he get?

As a result of the consistent value he provided, he has about 52,000 subscribers to his newsletter with has two subscription models; free and premium which he charges about $150-180 per year, he has sponsorship and brand deals, he charges companies to write guests posts on their blogs too. He makes around $500k-$1m year.

Did he leave his 9-5?

At the time of this writing, he still works as a CFO and continues to work on various projects.

Dan Koe – The Koe Letter

Dan Koe is an author who started out as a Freelancer, he took notice of topics people were writing about and felt he could do same because he was knowledgeable through the books he read, his experiences on business, then he began writing on Twitter. He focused on topics around “productivity“, “goal setting“, “Mindset“. He founded the The Koe Letter around 2019 , after posting on Twitter for about 2 years consistently.

How was he able to do that during his 9-5?

He has a very unique content ecosystem of writing where he starts the week with an outline for a post, he spends 1-2 hours every morning to work on it and sends out the “Letter” (as he calls it) at the end of the week. This “Letter” is used for tweets, scripts for a Youtube video, he basically re-uses this content for various social media platform.

What opportunities did he get?

The Koe Letter has about 175k subscribers, it continues to grow continuously. His experience has led him to become an author, attract sponsorship and he averages around $2-4m yearly.

Did he leave his 9-5?

Yes he did, he became full time Creator.

Matt Paulson – MarketBeat

Matt is the founder of MarketBeat, he started out with finance blog back in 2006 named “America Consumer News“, the experience he gathered from this blog allowed him to build more blogs in different finance niches.

In 2010, he had some issues with Google sending traffic to his blogs and decided to start growing an email list, this turned into “MarketBeat”, overtime it has become a Finance Company that has several offerings which includes Financial Market Analysis, Research Tools, Stock Market Data etc.

How was he able to do that during his 9-5?

He wrote in time blocks in the mornings and evenings , his intention was to create an asset instead of a hobby. An interesting system he used also was to batch content and automate where possible to avoid burnout.

What opportunities did he get?

He built his email list to over 4 million subscribers, the growth brought in sponsorship, brand deals and affiliate commissions (when other people buy products he advertises). Using this list he was able to control the revenue to about $40 million / year as at 2024.

Did he leave his 9-5?

Yes, he left to become a full-time founder.

Justin Welsh – The Saturday Solopreneur

Justin is a former SaaS executive that founded the Saturday Soloprenueur. According to Merriam-Webster, a solopreneur is an individual who organizes, manages, and assumes the risks of a business or enterprise without the help of a partner. He made a decision to start a solo-business after facing burnout as a high-paying professional, he had to choose between the high-pay and freedom. According to him:

Leaving a high-paying job was scary, but the need for freedom outweighed the fear of failure.”

He started out posting regularly on LinkedIn, where he shared valuable insights from his past experience working in his 9-5 and also on his journey building his business. His content attracted an audience that resonated with him, his insights and topics also relate to productivity and building a personal brand.

This audience led to him creating the newsletter in 2022 where he connects deeper with his audience.

How was he able to do that during his 9-5?

He worked in time blocks writing and taking ideas which he posted once a week on LinkedIn, once he built his following over there, he started posting into Twitter and finally the newsletter. Just like Dan Koe, he re-uses his content for various social media platform.

What opportunities did he get?

His email currently has about 77,000 subscribers and over 700k following on different social media platforms combined. He got sponsorships, brand deals, affiliate commissions (when people buy what he promotes) and courses (This brings in the majority of his revenue.)

Did he leave his 9-5?

Yes, he became a full time solopreneur and now has multiple streams of income.

Table Overview

Here is a tabular representation of all the people in a single view:

S/N	Name	Newsletter	How he started	How he found his topic	How much it took to start	Why he started	How long to Success	Opportunities gained	Left 9-5 Job?
1	CJ Gustafson	Mostly Metrics	Explaining complex financial topics to colleagues	Focused on Startup metrics	Substack and was writing weekly	To sharpen his thinking and help others in his field	6-12 months	Speaking gigs, brand deals, stronger professional brand	No
2	Dan Koe	The Koe Letter	Tweeting his thoughts and decided to become detailed	Digital Creativity, Mindset and solo business	Twitter and Notion writing once a week	To gain Freedom and build a digital audience	1 year	Online Products, Full-time Content Business	Yes
3	Matt Paulson	MarketBeat	Finance Blogs	Finance and Stock Market Data	Blog and writing every week	To build a meaningful project on the side	1-2 years	Turned it into a 7-figure business	Yes
4	Zain Kahn	Superhuman	Sharing tips on productivity tips he found helpful at work	Productivity, tools & personal growth	Writing for a few hours every week consistently	To build a personal brand	1 year	Sponsorships & collaborations	Yes
5	Justin Welsh	The Saturday Solopreneur	Started sharing his lessons online	systems, content, and solopreneurship	weekly writing and a simple format	To build freedom and test ideas for a solo business	6–12 months	Digital products, courses	Yes

Key Takeaway

The stories of these individuals are inspiring, these are my important points:

• You don’t have to be perfect in your first project, it provides a good lesson for your upcoming projects.
• The most resilient way to start an online business venture is by building an email list where you have control over the potential customers. Through this, you can be in direct contact to those customers you wish to serve.
• You don’t have to be the most knowledgeable at the beginning, every person has a different view to a particular topic, your unique viewpoint is a key to be different.
• This may sound cliche, but consistency is key to building anything meaningful. You have to find a posting frequency (weekly , bi-weekly , etc) and keep executing.
• You need to set the intention for what you are building towards at the beginning, whether as an asset or a side project. This helps you understand better what direction you take.

Conclusion

Starting a newsletter has shown it can become a sustainable income while providing value using your uniqueness. Emails have been in existence for over 30 years and it will continue to be used by a lot of people. Therefore, starting out a personal brand can using a email list is a very encouraging if you don’t want to be on social media posting yourself.

I hope you found this article helpful and until next time, have a great day!